August 26; Elder Holland? What?

Okay so Tuesday we had an appointment to teach someone. I don't know if I've told you about Jackson, but it was with Jackson. Jackson is friends with a guy in our ward. So they guy in our ward is our member present. Well the last lesson we had was two hours long! Are you kidding me? that's ridiculous and Jackson was falling asleep the whole time and me and sister Carter could never get a word in. Brother Parks, the member present, thinks he knows how to teach and what needs to be taught and it's ridiculous. He tells us right in the middle of the lesson what we're doing wrong and what we need to fix right in front of Jackson. And Brother Parks loves to go into deep doctrine and teach everything he knows. NO, we're supposed to teach simply and the basics. Last time we talked to him after and we got no where with him, because it's his way or no way and the conversations are very uncomfortable because it's kind of arguing but not and I hate it. Oh well. Well anyways, Tuesday he didn't show up. We called Jackson and his phone was disconnected. We called Mike and he thought the appointment was on Thursday. So we met on Thursday. Again, no one showed up. Oh well, that's missionary work I guess. We emailed him and haven't got a response yet. I was feeling kind of down. I haven't taught much and I'm still working on opening my mouth and talking to people at the visitors center and I was helping a family and I put them in the God's Plan movie and it's ten minutes long and then I talk to them after. And it's just a normal slow Friday night. and I'm waiting for the movie and I'm looking out our big glass window and a man comes walking up our stairs. It looks just like Elder Holland. OH MY GOODNESS IT IS ELDER HOLLAND!!!!!! Elder Holland came to the Portland Temple in Lake Oswego and the Visitors Center while I was there. It was unreal. ONce he walked in the door you could feel his strong spirit. You know what it's like when you feel the spirit this was times 100. He just came in for about 10-20 minutes. It was really fast. He shook everyones hand and asked where we were from. And everyone is crying and I have a new way of feeling the spirit and it's i can't stop smiling and im just so happy. so i was just smiling away and Elder Holland shook my hand and with his other hand pinched and patted my cheek hahahah he sure slaps people around haha and he's like "aren't you smiley?" hahah I just stood there like a weirdo really. I mean what do you do when your face to face with an apostle like that and you weren't expecting it? before he left he just talked to us missionaries for a second. It was only me and my companion and another companionship and a senior couple and the Johnstons. He said he prays for us everyday and there isn't a day or minute that goes by that he doesn't think of us. "you and the prophet are the most prayed for people in the church. you and Thomas Monson right here side by side." (he squats a little and puts his hands up in front of him.) he says we're both constants in his prayers. He said you keep testifying, you keep preaching, and the word will proceed you. When I shook his hand he pierced my soul with his bright blue eyes. He also said while shaking my hand, "sister harris, you are blessed and doing a great work; the lords work." He said missionary work is on his mind all the time, but now it's more personal for him because his grand daugthers out and his grandson is in the MTC. He loves the missionaries. "The church is run by revelation and when I say revelation, I mean we are in the Lord's house speaking with him." I don't know whether to take that literally or in prayer. The he said "we stand on Thursdays and every week without fail, we pray for the missionaries and the work of salvation." "The church could not be what it's destined to be or what it is now without you missionaries." It was such an amazing experience and it was what i needed to lift me up a little bit for the next week. I was so excited to tell everyone hopefully it all makes sense. love you all. the church is true. From meeting Holland face to face and feeling his spirit there is no doubt that he has been called of God to help us in these last days. I hope you all have a great week. love you all. 

~Sister Harris

August 19

Here are a few talks recommended by Sister Harris
Testimony of the Book of Mormon
His Grace is Sufficient (There's a video that goes along with this one, but I couldn't find it so if you can find it watch it, it's really good.)

Well this week went by really fast and I don't remember what I did. I realized I've been telling you a lot of not important things so I'll try and keep it short with important information. Last week for P-day we played softball with with our zone. Our zone is only made up of two districts. It was district against district. But the sisters from the other district decided not to show up.  It was really fun though. Our district made t-shirts and the Elders on the other team went to the thrift store and showed up looking like the kids on sandlot. it was so cute haha well this week we got in contact with another former investigator who wants to start meeting with us again once school starts. which is after labor day. so now we have two investigators like that. I'm super excited. also, the visitors center is opening up tomorrow and my mission call will be starting for real. This week we also met with Jackson and found out he is our investigator now. We've been sitting in on lessons because his member friend who is in our ward wanted us to. His member friend gets way too intense in the lessons and goes way too deep and makes the lessons way too long. It's awful. We start teaching him this week and we talked to his friend and told him if he wants us to start teaching we're keeping it simple and no longer than 45 minutes and if we have to we can take multiple visits for one lesson. so hopefully this next lesson goes a lot smoother. And this week we went on exchanges. I went on exchanges with Hermana Quijada and she is serving in the English ward of Beaverton. She warned me before we got there that Beaverton is like another country. She was right. It was so scary. It made me grateful for my comfortable place in Lake Oswego.  She made us tract all day. I hate tracting and it's the least effective way to find people but apparently not in Beaverton. We found about 5 potentials. First we went street contacting at the Farmers Market. We found one person there. and first off. When we go tracting in Lake Oswego no one answers their door. Probably because they have cameras on their porch and decide not to answer. So this was basically my first time actually talking to people. It was really scary, but I got used to starting the conversations and then Sister Q took over. So one day i will be comfortable finishing it haha and then we tracted out an apartment complex. an entire one! we found five people really interested and want us to come back. but i can't go back. only she can. we also went to go visit a non member in really sketchy trailor park. we walked in and this old lady we a little beard told us we looked really pretty and gave us a hug and held us there forever and gave us a blessing. i was trying my hardest not to laugh. we gave her the move testaments. she wouldn't take anything else. she had her own religion. That night we ate dinner at a members house. they had 6 kids and that ward also feeds the spanish missionaries and they are in a trio and one of the missionaries was Elder Hadlock. It was so nice to catch up with him. and Dinner was crazy. I loved it. the members in lake oswego are old and ive only ate with one family with kids and they were older kids. well last about all that's exciting that's happening here in good ole Oregon. love you all!

Current Addresses

Jess's address until OCT. 14:Sister Jessica Marell Harris
                                            4893 Parkview Dr. Apt. M
                                            Lake Oswego, OR 97035
* ONLY send LETTERS to this address*

Mission Home address:  Sister Jessica Marell Harris
                                      Oregon Portland Mission
                                      1400 NW Compton Dr. Ste 250
                                      Beaverton, OR 97006
*Send PACKAGES to MISSION HOME ADDRESS*

August 12; The work is Progressing

So I don't know if I told you right before I got here the Portland mission boundries were changed. Portland is really small now. I don't even think the airport is in our mission anymore. anyways, so our areas are smaller. We just have the lake oswego ward boundries and it's cut in half because we have two sets of missionaries in our ward.  The lake oswego area is a very hard area anyways. They are very wealthy here and no one thinks we have anything that would make them happier than what they already have. So the last two weeks we've been full prosyliting sisters because the visitors center is closed and we've been starting with no investigators or anything. So last week all four of us have been sick and we didn't really get anything done. but while we were contacting a referral which wasn't home like usual and so we decided to tract the area because we had an hour until dinner. so the next house we went to my companion decided it should be my first door approach. so i knocked and told her who we were and asked if she'd heard of us. she said "yes, been there done that. come in." wow my first door approach got us in. nice work sister harris. so we talked to her for a little bit and then asked her what been there done that meant. she was a convert. she got married in the temple. but then her and her husband had a lot of questions that no one would answer and so they started doing research. We were there for like two hours and she was trying to shake our testimonies and start questioning. Everything we said we backed it up with something, but all we really could do was bear our testimonies. She told us not one of the things she told us would make her leave it was all of them combined. It was heart breaking. During the week some members told us about a lady who goes to primary with her kids who isn't a member who is a former investigator and that we should go talk to her. We went and saw her and she goes to primary because she had no religious background and doesn't know anything and that the lessons got way too overwhelming. but she's ready to start taking the lessons again once school starts. Yay! our hard work is finally paying off. We have one investigator haha and then on sunday a guy in the ward came up to us and said he had a friend who wanted to start taking the lessons. The visitors center is opened on sundays so he brought him to the visitors center and started with the first lesson and the ward member took over and made it way too deep. we need to talk to him about that. but now we technically have two investigators! yay haha we didn't do much this week but we're getting somewhere. The church is true my friends! There is no way Joseph Smith could have made any of this up. Why would he go through all that he did and put his family through it if it wasn't true. It brings so much joy to me, but there will be hard times because of oppossion in all things. You should read Safety for the Soul by Elder Holland. IT's amazing. love you all. miss you. see ya soon
Here's a link to the talk she was talking about.Safety for The Soul - Elder Holland

August 5; first week in Oregon

First lets take care of some business. It's pretty sad when I get a letter from my companions mom from Tennessee before I get one from anyone in Utah. Just because I'm out of the MTC doesn't mean I don't need letters. I do!

Now to the good stuff I guess. This week has been interesting. We are full proselyting and my companion has never done that before so we've had a hard time filling up all of our time. I'm new and don't know excatly what we're supposed to do. I suggest things but she's too scared to do them, doesn't want to, or we can't. I don't know. I never know what's going on. We contacted some referrals earlier last week and only one was interested and so we set up a time to come back and they weren't home. We went back like a million times and they never answered the door. So we did some tracting on that street and saw them pull out of their driveway and leave haha some people. The joys of being a missionary. Another lady we went to we knocked and her dogs were barking and she told them to be quiet but would never answer the door. Its happened many other times too haha I just laugh everytime and my companion doesnt think it is funny. We have to laugh about something though.  Thursday we had an all day training meeting for new missionaries and I finally figured out who my mission president looks like. Bob Barker haha it's crazy. His wife is the cutest. She is always matching. She always has on a plain colored cardigan, the same color of shoes, earrings, and a patterened skirt the same color. I just love her.

Friday was a busy day we had a lot of appointments and people to see and of course no one was home. I haven't got to do any teaching yet and it's frustrating.

On Saturday we helped a single mom move into our ward. she was excited to have sister missionaries in the ward because now she can have us over for dinner because she wasn't allowed to feed the elders unless she invited people to come over. and a fun fact about her she graduated from American Fork. The Relief Society president used to work at the Albertsons in American Fork and a member has family in American Fork and I know them. It's so great to have little connections everywhere.

Its been sunny and 90 here. it's been great. there has been one cloudy cold rainy day and i was freezing haha and everyones lawns are dead and brown. worse than utah. weird huh? fun fact about oregon. you can't get your own gas. it's illegal. so i love getting gas because you don't have to do anything haha

Oh and Saturday also we were teaching a less active and trying to get her to come to church and my companion said oh you should come because us missionaries are teaching sunday school. and i was like what? and she's like ya. i forgot to tell you. so that was nice haha the lesson was only two pages long and we didn't know how to split it up between the four of us so we decided to teach the first two lessons and me and my companion had the second lesson but we barely made it through the first lesson so we have to teach next week. atleast we have more time. also the lady teaching relief society called me and my companion up to talk about missionary work and I made everyone cry. I touched their spirits. It made me feel pretty good. also on sunday the visitors center was open and i walked in and immediately felt the spirit and didn't want to leave. at first it was hard to open my mouth to talk to people but once i did i placed my first book of mormon! yes it takes me longer than others but oh well. it was a great experience.  In the visitors center we're supposed to get familiar with all the videos on i'm a mormon and the mormon messages. they are fantastic and i encourage you call to watch them! they are amazing.

The church is true guys! God lives! He knows me and each one of you! he knows my strengths and my weaknesses and exactly how to push me and make me stronger. I wouldn't still be out here without him. He's holding my hand every step of the way. Delegate things to the Lord! He wants to help you. Yes he knows you and whats going on and what you need but he needs you to realize it and ask. so just ask!

Love you all. Miss you.

~Sister Harris

Pictures

Sister Harris before she entered the MTC

All the girls in her MTC district

Sister Harris and her MTC companion Sister Andrus

 

All three wearing the same dress from Mika Rose

Sister Harris and Elder McGary

The Prayer Pillow

Sister Harris and her friend Chelsea

Sister Harris. Her friend Elder Crandall, and their companions

The Portland Oregon missionaries at a baptism

July 26

Hello my friends,

 

Two pdays in one week. How many people get to say that? haha today is mostly to do laundry and pack and stuff but they said we could email.

nothing much has happened since tuesday. we started our new training with our new teachers. It's only the 6 of us sisters. last week they had 32 sisters going to visitor centers. I feel like they messed up with us because they didn't know we were coming to Temple Square on Wednesday but things worked out. and how many people get to say they get to go on a field trip in the MTC? not many. so it's pretty sweet. we went to temple square and traffic was awful because of the parade and since we were there during the parade there was no one in the visitors center and all the sisters were at the parade so our teacher gave us a tour and some guy came and talked to us about our visitors center and told us how the Bretheren choose visitor center sisters because only 2% of missionaries are called to a visitors center. He actually quoted L. Tom Perry who said once our picture comes up on screen they can see the light of Christ in our eyes and out testimony of the antonement in our smile. That was a very humbling experience knowing the twelve could see that in me. I need to live up to my potential and get my head in gear.  On saturday we get to go again and be paired with a sister there and get to actually do what we're going to be doing in a few days. I'm so excited. Expect the Portland Temple and visitors center is closed starting July 29 right when I get there. Imagine that. Oh well haha Also, during our training this week a new thing the church is starting is a referral center thing. It's all online and only visitors centers have it right now. what we do is we get online and people can chat with us about any question they have about the gospel whether it is a non member or member. So now how many people get to say they taught real investigators from the outside world in the MTC? My experience here has been unreal. My companion and I only got to talk to two people online and they were both members. but it was still fun to search for their questions. Having it online is nice because you can search for the answer and talk with your companion before you give them an answer and since you're on the computer you have access to all church websites and can send them links. It's awesome. Since the class is just 6 sisters and a sister teacher I have got so much more out of it. Not that my other teachers were bad. It's just now from a womans perspective and she understands us better. It's way nice.

 

That's about all that has been happening. My companions mom made us all prayer pillows with our names embroidered on them. they are so cute. It makes me want to pray so much more. my knees are in heaven haha

 

Love you all. Miss you

 

~Sister Harris

Jess

 

P.s ill be on later to send pictures but the computers keep freezing right now.

July 23

Hello Everyone,

 

Second week down, one more to go. I love the MTC, but I feel like im sufficating. I need to get out of the gates. The sad thing is the thing I look forward to every Sunday is the temple walk because we get out, but not that far.  But the last two Sundays Sister Andrus and I couldn't find the way out of our little community. It was a little embarrassing. Oh well, what do we do that isn't embarrassing really?  This last week went so fast. I never believed people that said once you get to the first sunday everything gets better and goes faster. That is definately true. Well im sure you all want and update on our Asian investigator, Belinda.  Well we went back and she read the Book of Mormon and knew it was true, but didn't want to get baptized becasue of us. She didn't like our personalities and said we didn't know what we were doing.  It was awful. We left early.  But at the end we asked her if she could pray and she said yes and it was the most powerful prayer we had ever heard.  She is definately a member, because she is there every week to make missionaries grow and cry by realizing their weaknesses.  It was a great experience because we knew exactly what we needed to work on.  Also, this week we had a referal and we thought it was from Belinda becasue that's who they said it was from, but it wasn't. Thank goodness. It was a sweet old couple and the lady was from Ireland and had an awesome accent. We taught them the restoration and ended with a prayer.  They're not supposed to come out of character, but they did.  They told us how they could feel the spirit so strong and that we worked well together and that we were going to be amazing missionaries.  It was just what we needed to hear, because we didn't feel like we were imporving since we taught Belinda.  They just returned from their missions in Washington and he just retired from the MTC.  So hearing from him that we were doing great really boosted our confidence.

 

Well, the all of our Elders in our zone left this morning :( and the sisters in our zone left yesterday :( it's so empty and sad without them and it hasn't even been that long without them. Our zone was really close. well just the other district that came the same time as us.  There was so much love haha i've never felt so much love. It's so great. Tomorrow we get to go to temple square in the morning to start our training. I'm still not sure what we are doing.  We also go again on Saturday night.  And becasue our schedule is chaninging we get two pdays this week!!! sweet! it's on friday.

 

Today has already been rough because the Elders left and it's Sister Newsons anniversary of her brother dying and she's been having a really hard time. She gets to call her family today, so that'll be nice. but since she is getting so much attention Sister Melgaard, the bipolar one, feels like she isn't getting enough so she's being a difficult today too.  Sister Andrus and I don't know how to deal with any of it. It's really hard. Another thing is that the first few nights Sister Newson hasn't been able to sleep becasue she keeps replaying things of her brothers death in her head so we have to sleep with one of our vanity lights on and it lights up the whole room and it's hard to sleep. I can't complain because my issues aren't nearly as big as any of theirs and I don't know how to help them.

 

Well I love you all!

 

Please write through DearElder so I feel like I'm getting letters haha and they come same day

 

~Sister Harris

July 16

Hey Everyone,

First off, thank you all so much for the Birthday cards and packages! I loved them all and I love you all! Being away from home on my birthday was pretty weird but not a big deal. My district made it the best. They made everyone sing to me every where we went. I don't like attention haha

A few things you need to know about me, I can't spell and there is so much to tell you this email may be a little jumpy.

I made it through my first week! Thank goodness. Things are going well. I haven't got homesick yet so that's good, but weird. Things are going much better than I thought they'd be haha My companion is great! Her name is Sister Andrus. She is part Samoan and I'm darker than her so I'm pretty happy about that, she's not haha she's from Mapleton, UT so pretty foreign. We get along great! We're pretty much the same person except that she is a louder version of me.  She is going to the Rochester, NY mission and the Hillcomora Visitors center. So I'm pretty sad I only have three weeks with her.  The days are pretty long being trapped in a little classrooom and not seeing daylight but it's alright. My teachers are great but it's weird because they are really close to my age. My district is awesome. We started out with four Elders and six sisters but an Elder went home on Friday so now there is only three. Two of the Elders are 19 and one is fresh out of high school and 18. All the sisters live in my room. We get along so well. Three of them are 19 and one is 21 and Sister Andrus and I are 20. Sister Miller (Morgan Miller) went to Davis High and knows Jessi Crosland so thats pretty cool. She was a cheer leader so I don't know if Parker would know her or not. Oh also, Parker I met an Elder Halford (Spencer Halford) I think that's his name. He said he loves you and the reason he even went to school haha I guess you're pretty cool lol anyways the first day within the first few hours I lost the back of my name tag, the magnet part and got my key stuck in my door so they had to call a lock smith which wasn't necessary.  Pretty embarrassing but whatever. Anyways, back to my district. Sister Newson who is Sister Millers companion is 19 and from Las Vegas.  They are both going to New York also.  She was a cheerleader also and I'm pretty sure her and Sister Miller are sister seperated at birth. It's weird. Then there is Sister Priday who is 19 and from Gilbert, AZ and Sister Melgaard who is 21 and from Ridby, ID.  They are both going to Portland. Elder Willson is from Smithfeild, Elder Savage is from Mesa and Elder Freeman is from Brigham City. Pointless information I know. Well everything was going great until Friday and our district fell apart. Elder Tipiani went home on Friday and Sister Melgaard had a little anxiety attack and talked to some people and found out she is bipolar and and had OCD. She started out all sweet and now she is just mean. She got permission from the Branch President to do her own thing so she can work things out and it's hard because we all want to be in class and obey the rules but Sister Priday wants to be in class and not follow her around everywhere. So it's getting pretty stressful. But it is such a blessing to have Sister Miller and Sister Newson in our district because both of their moms are bipolar so they know how to deal with it. Also, Sister Newsons brother committed suicide right before she came because he was bipolar and didn't want to hurt anyone. She was really supposed to leave on May 29 but there was a reason she needed to be in our district at this time. The reason Sister Melgaard is still here is because she doesn't have much family support and we need to help her. She hasn't got a single letter or package since she's been here. It's really sad. But it's amazing how much God is really looking out for all of us and knows each of our individual needs.

So we got our first investigators...Bob Nash (which is just one of our teachers) and Belinda Moey (which is a volunteer, but could be a real investigator). Belinda...she is so scary.  We went into the first lesson fairly convident about it. She is asian and doesn't believe in God. We asked her if we could pray when we got in there and she said it was fine. First, off she wasn't even going to let us in. and we prayed selfishly. We prayed for the spirit and we should've been praying for her. We explained God as best as we could and tried to answer all her questions (but she had a heavy accent) and she yelled at us. It was the longest 45 minutes of my life. Sister Andrus and I started crying when we left. Luckily we only teach her one more time haha It was a real slap in the face that we need to get ourselves in gear. We've both been fine and obeying all the rules but we can do better. always room for improvement. But since we've been fine we have been having a hard time feeling the spirit and think we're just going along with whatever happens and we really know we're supposed to be there and we're trying hard we just don't know what's wrong.

On a happier note. I saw Chelsea the other day and it was so nice to talk to her! It's always nice to see a familiar face here.

The temple is closed so we can't go to the temple the whole time we're here :( and our Elders leave next Tuesday. They are going to Nampa, ID. They are pretty solid Elders. You need a pretty good personality to be going there when you live so close. Once the Elders leave our last week we get to go up to Temple Square for the rest of our training. Only for the mornings though and we get to be companions with a sister that is serving up there right now. I'm pretty excited.

Well, I can't think of anything else to tell you all expect send letters! I have all day today to write letters and no one to write haha

Love you all! Miss you like crazy! 18 months will fly by. see you all soon :)

~Sister Harris

Jess :)